October122017

June272015

“A woman identified by a protest organizer as Bree Newsome, a 30-year-old youth organizer from Charlotte, North Carolina, climbed the flagpole[of the South Carolina capitol building]before 6am and took down the controversial emblem of the antebellum, slaveholding south, with the assistance of another activist. Newsome was halfway up the 30ft pole when police demanded that she climb back down, but she continued upward and removed the flag.

Activist Mervyn Marcano told the Guardian that when Newsome returned to the ground she and James Ian Dyson were arrested by capitol police and taken to a detention center.

Sherri Iacobelli, a spokeswoman for the state Department of Public Safety, told the Associated Press Newsome and Tyson, 30, also of Charlotte, had been charged with defacing monuments on state capitol grounds, a misdemeanor that carries a fine of up to $5,000 and a prison term of up to three years, or both.

‘The flag represents white supremacy,’ said 25-year-old Tamika Lewis, another activist from Charlotte. ‘The image alone is used to ignite fear and intimidation, especially among people of color and
minorities.

‘Taking it down is a long time coming.’

Lewis noted that the flag was raised above the capitol in 1961, after African American students marched through the city – and after more than 180 of them were arrested. She said the fact of a rally to support the flag shows ‘there’s nothing being hidden’ about the
persistence of racism in America more than half a century later.

‘This was a Confederate symbol that ignited an individual to kill and murder innocent black people in a church, and it was still erected,’ she said. ‘The legislature was just taking too long to act
morally and justly. They’re dragging their feet.’

Lewis said that the group hopes to secure Newsome’s release and to fight for minimal charges against her, and that the act of civil disobedience inspires others to ‘start becoming active agents in their own change’.

The activists said they took matters into their own hands because of state leaders’ lethargic response and apparent reluctance to deal with the issue.

‘We removed the flag today because we can’t wait any longer,’ Newsome said in a release sent to the Guardian. ‘It’s time for a new chapter where we are sincere about dismantling white supremacy and building toward true racial justice and equality.’

The flag, which flies at the capitol but not on the building under state law, was raised again shortly after it was lowered, in time for a rally by supporters of the symbol scheduled for later on Saturday.

This week, Republican South Carolina governor Nikki Haley called for the flag to be taken down, in an emotional speech that declared ‘the time has come’. But only the state legislature can mandate its removal. That body voted to debate the flag, but has not yet taken up the issue.”

“The manifesto is here, but since it’s been publicized you may not be able to get through to the site; it’s apparently a low budget shared server and it’s bogging down badly under the heavy traffic. (Here it is at the Internet Archive.)

In any case, the manifesto is a grotesquely racist screed, filled with hatred toward blacks and Hispanics and obsessed with the very common conservative meme of ‘black on white crime.’

Roof credits the white supremacist group called the Council of Conservative Citizens with ‘awakening’ him to ‘black on white crime,’ following the shooting death of Trayvon Martin. And that’s an interesting parallel to Gateway Pundit Jim Hoft, who has also used the CCC website as a source numeroustimes for his racist blog posts.

The website of the Council of Conservative Citizens is apparently offline today, and that’s probably not just a coincidence.”